Castle of Black Iron

After leaving Youzhou City 2 months ago, Zhang Tie returned to Youzhou City by airship once again on December 30th, the 899th year of Black Iron Calendar.

Zhang Tie was a bit depressed on the journey as he had to stay in the airship for a whole day. By contrast, if he could fly there himself, it would only take him 4-5 hours from Yanghe Prefecture to Youzhou City. For the sake of convenience, he could directly fly over there; however, as a black iron knight, it would be too shocking if he just flew there himself. As he had already been very famous in Youzhou Province, Zhang Tie didn’t want to be any hotter anymore; therefore, he just chose to go there by airship.

Thankfully, he could spend almost 20 hours to absorb about 10 earth-element crystals in the flight.

Over these days, although Zhang Tie looked free, he didn’t slow down his cultivation speed. Even at home, he would also spend at least 10 hours a day in cultivation. He constantly formed his earth chakra at the speed of using up 1 earth-element crystal per 2 hours.

Zhang Tie absorbed earth-element crystals at a very shocking speed. He would consume at least 5 earth-element crystals a day. Therefore, he had consumed over 300 earth-element crystals over the past 2 months.

...

In the berth cabin of the airship, after absorbing one earth-element crystal in his hand, Zhang Tie felt that a complex geometric pattern composed of triangles and rounds on the rim of a part of the earth chakra of the King Roc Sutra finally turned bright. It was like assembling a huge machine. After it was assembled, Zhang Tie felt that one dragon scale on his knight’s crystal plate turned golden at once. Zhang Tie knew that he had already lit 11 dragon scales.

It was the 8th earth-element crystal that Zhang Tie had used up since he boarded the airship. It indicated that Zhang Tie had already cultivated in his berth cabin for 16 hours silently. Such a period was not long for a person who had stayed in the tower of time for 15 years. However, he needed to relax too. After lighting the 11 dragon scale, he had improved his battle strength a bit more. Therefore, Zhang Tie stopped today’s cultivation.

After opening his eyes, Zhang Tie threw the useless earth-element crystal into Castle of Black Iron. After that, he picked himself up; warmed up his limbs and sensed his physical and spiritual changes before opening the hatch door and walking out of his berth cabin.

"Elder Mushen!" Two bodyguards on the airship hurriedly gave a salute to him when they saw Zhang Tie coming out of his berth cabin.

According to the schedule, this airship should arrive at Youzhou City at about 9 am. It was about 5 am when the day had just broken. It was still far away from the estimated arrival time. Given the distance, this airship should still be about 500 miles away from Youzhou City.

"Tell the captain, I will arrive there ahead of you. You can just arrive at Youzhou City on time!" After leaving a message to the two guards, Zhang Tie came to the open deck. After breathing the chill air, he directly flew off the deck towards Youzhou City.

Even if someone saw him flying towards Youzhou City from here, it would not arouse any doubts.

After flying in the air once again, Zhang Tie felt as free and pleasant as fish in the sea and bird in the sky.

With the protection of his protective battle qi, Zhang Tie could almost not sense the chill wind in the high altitude.

In heavy wind and snow, Zhang Tie gradually elevated and deepened into the thick, grey clouds in the troposphere.

Snowflakes were coming into being in the thick, grey clouds. With the strong knight’s consciousness, Zhang Tie was meticulously tasting how the virtual vapor gradually became glittering snowflakes. ’What a nice process!’

In each second, hundreds of millions of beautiful snowflakes would fall off the thick, grey cloud with the chilly wind...

Penetrating through the thick, grey cloud where snowflakes were gradually coming into being, Zhang Tie felt like flying in a brilliant park. He could see and sense numerous glittering nice snowflakes silently blossoming in the air in each split second. Watching those "water spirits" blossoming, floating in the air and landing on the land, Zhang Tie felt vacant inside...

In Zhang Tie’s consciousness of knight, such a scene was super splendid.

Who else could enjoy such a realm of super greatness in the universe except for knights?

It required sun’s temperature, namely the strength of fire, to evaporate water from the surface of the ground. Due to evaporation and desublimation, water manifested its different forms in different spatial locations. After that, snowflakes would return to the land by wind. The whole life of a small piece of snowflakes was affected by the four elements such as earth, water, wind and fire in the universe.

In the vacant state, Zhang Tie had a new insight from these snowflakes, which reminded him of the forming and disappearing bubbles in water.

On the vast white land, the undulating mountain ranges were like silver snakes while the plains were like running white elephants. In such a vacant state, Zhang Tie gradually saw the contour of Youzhou City when he was already 70 miles away from Youzhou City.

At the sight of Youzhou City, Zhang Tie almost forgot something.

In the thick, grey cloud, Zhang Tie directly called 6 thunder hawks out of Castle of Black Iron.

The two bigger thunder hawks had been very familiar with the outside world; however, the other 4 smaller ones were very curious and excited about this new world; especially the snowy day. They kept chirping while flying around Zhang Tie.

At the request of their "father", the 4 younger thunder hawks had to accept the baptism of a lightning bolt in their lives like why a flying moth would dart into the fire. It originated from their instinctive impulse.

If thunder hawks could survive the baptism of a lightning bolt, they might accomplish an evolution in their lives. If they failed, they might be heavily wounded or lose their lives. The first thunder hawk that Zhang Tie raised was caught by someone in the Selnes Theater of Operations after being struck by the lightning bolt. The 4 younger thunder hawks’ mother was also wounded when she accepted the baptism of a lightning bolt. However, she was lucky as she was not captured by people.

Standing still in the air, Zhang Tie watched these thunder hawks who came to Taixia Country with him from Waii Sub-continent with a tender look.

These thunder hawks were not only his pets but also his partners and comrades-in-arms...

"Go, go to the north, there are fewer people over there. Remember to survive back!" Zhang Tie instructed them while pointing at the sky in the north.

It was Liaozhou Province in the north of Youzhou Province, which was a wild province with fewer people.

Thunder hawks were born to be hardly captured. These thunder hawks were smarter and stronger due to the training of Aziz in Castle of Black Iron while those younger thunder hawks had mastered hunting skills. In Liaozhou Province, they would have a fewer chance to meet people. Even if they were struck by a lightning bolt, they didn’t need to worry about being captured by people.

Those thunder hawks chirped and flew around Zhang Tie for a short while. Finally, Zhang Tie waved his hand towards them. After knowing Zhang Tie’s intention, they instantly penetrated through the clouds and flew towards the north as fast as a lightning bolt facing the heavy wind and snow.

Seeing them off, Zhang Tie felt a bit sad. Because he didn’t know how many among the 4 younger thunder hawks could survive back. However, it was their fates. They had to accept the challenge from their fates like how Zhang Tie was coming here to accept the challenge from his own fate. They could not avoid that; instead, they could only face that.

Until the 6 thunder hawks disappeared in his vision did Zhang Tie move his eyes to Youzhou City in the distance. He then accelerated towards Youzhou City.

Zhang Tie came here today after receiving a message from Huaiyuan Palace that the Clan head had something to negotiate with the other elders of Zhang Clan yesterday.

As Count Long Wind had been the provincial governor of Youzhou Province, no matter how influential and great Zhang Tie was in Youzhou Province, he should never think about having Zhang Taixuan invite him to Golden Light City. Nobody else across Youzhou Province had such a right. In the Northeast Military Region, only Commander Cheng was qualified to call a provincial governor of Youzhou Province.

Zhang Tie didn’t know why Zhang Taixuan summoned him; however, he knew that it must be a major event.

2 days ago, all the procedures about purchasing the land had been handled. Through this journey, he could bring back those documents about land ownership, atlas and certificates about property right and title deed for land. From then on, Zhang Tie’s family would enter the list of major landlords in Youzhou Province; the land area of Zhang Tie’s family would reach 200,000 square miles, which was equal to 1/4 of that of Yanghe Prefecture.

The new land was also incorporated into the administrative area of Yanghe Prefecture. After the city was built, Zhang Tie and Zhang Yang planned to have their dad be the major of Jinwu City...